Effective treatment and prevention of caries and periodontal disease depends upon the ability to accurately examine and ascertain the condition of a patient's gum pockets. This is especially important in public health or general clinical situations. Caries activity tests for infants, for example, are administered by measuring pH levels of saliva or tartar obtained from gum pockets using the calorimetric method or hydrogen ion concentration. These tests determine the bacterial breeding ratios and the maturation of the diseased part of the gum.
A drawback of both the calorimetric and the hydrogen-ion concentration tests is that they require a relatively large sample quantity. Moreover, it is difficult to take samples of saliva and tartar from infants, and when the sample is not tested immediately after collection, the rapidly changing culture condition makes accurate pH measurement difficult. With existing collection techniques, sample collection to the diseased part of the mouth, such as a gum pocket. It would therefore be desirable to have a device that could directly measure the pH level at the affected part of the gum.
It would also be desirable if the device could measure the temperature of a diseased part of a gum to assist in effective diagnosis and treatment. During a dental operation, it often becomes necessary to monitor the temperature of the spot that is being operated upon, so that the heat generated by friction from the drilling and puncture of teeth and bones does not destroy the surrounding cells. Existing devices do not offer appropriate means to measure temperature, leading dentists to cool the diseased parts based on their own experience. Since this lacks accuracy, a suitable temperature measurement device has been sought.
The design of existing dental probes can be adapted to provide these features. One such existing probe is described in allowed U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/869,523 to Hideyuki Takeuchi, one of the inventors of the present invention. That probe is designed to measure the depth of the diseased part of a gum pocket. It comprises a handle with a needle on the distal end, wherein the needle has etched gradations on its tip to enable measurement. The needle tip can also probe diseased spots in the oral cavity. The rear part of the probe's handle has a light receptor which remains outside the mouth when the needle tip is inserted in the gum pocket, creating a path for light to the needle and the vicinity of the gum pocket.
That probe can be easily adapted to measure pH levels and temperature. Since the dentist can accurately guide the probe's needle tip to a diseased part of the gum, he can obtain a direct and accurate measurement of the pH level with an electric device at the needle tip. The dentist can also accurately measure temperature with a temperature sensor on the needle tip.